A Place For You And Me--
A Place where Published and Unpublished Writers' Voices can be heard, where struggles and successes are shared, support and advice offered, books promoted ...

Sunday, May 27, 2012

At your core...what type of writer are you?

Memorial Day is around the corner, and as I gather with my friends and family, I find myself being asked the same question repeatedly, "What kind of writer are you?"

As authors, we've all had this question asked of us in one way or another. But, this time, the person asking the question didn't want my canned response, "I write women's fiction." They wanted more. Why? Because telling her I wrote "Women's fiction" didn't mean anything to her.

Her response, "What does that mean?"

So, you see my situation, right? The way we describe ourselves and/or our writing outside of writing circles...what does it mean?

One of my friends--a writer--once described my writing as "...down home...".

Honestly, I have to admit, I think I sat feeling a little dumb as I tried to think of how I would describe what I write to someone without sounding any dumber than I must have looked.

Unnecessarily, I began to describe the plots of some of my books.

As her eyes began to glaze over, I realized she really wasn't looking for the long answer. She really just wanted me to keep it short and sweet. After I ran my published and unpublished works through my brain on some sort of speed review, I came up with the following:

-family
-love
-loss
-forgiveness of self or others
-rebuilding

These were the elements that seemed to be included in most of my works. I guess at my core, these themes continue to be repeated in my writing.

I have two new short stories that will soon be released: Derailed and Love All Over Me. Derailed at it's core is about a homeless female veteran, and Love All Over Me is about a woman who lost her husband in an accident, and must move on without him.

When you're sitting around talking to your friends and family, how do you describe your writing? Can you share your list of ingredients?

Good question, Angela. Long ago, I was told that my experienced colleagues, to develop a vision/voice for my writing...a kind of umbrella purpose. Here's mine:

I write about people who have the heart, vision and nascent ability to inspire, persuade and deftly lead others to improve the world by learning to love well and by learning to work together for the good of a family/community.

I know...pretty high-flying. But it's what I write...and how I hope my writing affects my readers.